Enterprise

Andy Jassy overruled AWS recommendation a senior exec be fired for discrimination, sources say

The parameters of the case involving AWS' Joshua Burgin are similar to other ones filed by current and former AWS executives. But in this instance, it went straight to the top.

Andy Jassy

Andy Jassy allegedly prevented Joshua Burgin's firing.

Photo: F. Carter Smith/Bloomberg via Getty Images

Amazon CEO Andy Jassy intervened to prevent the firing of a top executive after an internal HR report recommended his termination following claims of discriminatory behavior within AWS, two sources familiar with the matter told Protocol.

According to the sources, a Black female AWS employee told HR in 2019 that Joshua Burgin had made what she believed were discriminatory comments to her. At the time, Burgin was chief of staff to AWS engineering legend and senior leadership team member Charlie Bell. An internal AWS team investigated the allegations and recommended in a report that Burgin be fired, the sources said.

The sources said that a group of senior Amazon executives — including HR Vice President Ian Wilson, HR Senior Vice President Beth Galetti and Bell himself — met to discuss the report about Burgin. During that meeting, the sources said, those executives decided to meet with Jassy, who was then CEO of AWS, before making a final decision on Burgin's fate.

But that meeting with Jassy never happened, the sources said. Instead, they said, Bell had a private conversation with Jassy and urged him to intervene to prevent Burgin's termination. The sources said it was ultimately Jassy who made the decision to keep Burgin. He remained at the company, becoming general manager of AWS Outposts in June 2020.

Neither Burgin nor Bell, who left Amazon in August, responded to requests for comment.

Presented with a detailed account of the the events described here, Amazon did not dispute any of the facts, responding instead with an emailed statement: "We take all allegations of discrimination seriously and investigate them fully. In this instance, we conducted a thorough investigation and took what we believe was the appropriate corrective action." The company declined to disclose what corrective action was taken.

Famed women's rights attorney Gloria Allred is now representing the employee involved in the Burgin case, sources previously told Protocol. Allred, who was also presented with a detailed account of the events, declined to comment.

The revelation is evidence that in at least one case, top AWS executives sidelined a team tasked with conducting internal probes into allegations of misbehavior. It's also further evidence of claims made by employees that the process to review such reports is not "fair, objective or transparent," according to a petition signed by hundreds of employees.

The parameters of the case are similar to other ones filed by current and former AWS executives. For example, Charlotte Newman, who remains employed by Amazon, alleged in her own suit a culture of discrimination rooted in both sexism and racism. Amazon is now facing several lawsuits over alleged discrimination and sexual harassment at AWS.

The company solicited Oppenheimer Investigations Group to conduct an internal probe into employee complaints over the process to report such claims, sources previously told Protocol.

Jassy became CEO of Amazon in July after founder Jeff Bezos announced plans to transition into an executive chairman role in January. AWS is now run by Adam Selipsky, who was a longtime sales executive during the early days of the cloud pioneer's ascent into one of the most powerful companies in enterprise tech before leaving to become CEO of Tableau.

Update 9/2: Although, as noted, Amazon did not dispute any of the facts in this article before publication, the company provided an additional statement on Thursday in which it said the following: "The suggestion that Andy overruled a recommendation provided to him in this case is not correct. As with any disciplinary decision, as more data was presented and discussions continued, opinions on the appropriate course of action evolved. The final recommendation was the one ultimately pursued." A company spokesperson declined to answer follow-up questions on the record.

Fintech

Judge Zia Faruqui is trying to teach you crypto, one ‘SNL’ reference at a time

His decisions on major cryptocurrency cases have quoted "The Big Lebowski," "SNL," and "Dr. Strangelove." That’s because he wants you — yes, you — to read them.

The ways Zia Faruqui (right) has weighed on cases that have come before him can give lawyers clues as to what legal frameworks will pass muster.

Photo: Carolyn Van Houten/The Washington Post via Getty Images

“Cryptocurrency and related software analytics tools are ‘The wave of the future, Dude. One hundred percent electronic.’”

That’s not a quote from "The Big Lebowski" — at least, not directly. It’s a quote from a Washington, D.C., district court memorandum opinion on the role cryptocurrency analytics tools can play in government investigations. The author is Magistrate Judge Zia Faruqui.

Keep ReadingShow less
Veronica Irwin

Veronica Irwin (@vronirwin) is a San Francisco-based reporter at Protocol covering fintech. Previously she was at the San Francisco Examiner, covering tech from a hyper-local angle. Before that, her byline was featured in SF Weekly, The Nation, Techworker, Ms. Magazine and The Frisc.

The financial technology transformation is driving competition, creating consumer choice, and shaping the future of finance. Hear from seven fintech leaders who are reshaping the future of finance, and join the inaugural Financial Technology Association Fintech Summit to learn more.

Keep ReadingShow less
FTA
The Financial Technology Association (FTA) represents industry leaders shaping the future of finance. We champion the power of technology-centered financial services and advocate for the modernization of financial regulation to support inclusion and responsible innovation.
Enterprise

AWS CEO: The cloud isn’t just about technology

As AWS preps for its annual re:Invent conference, Adam Selipsky talks product strategy, support for hybrid environments, and the value of the cloud in uncertain economic times.

Photo: Noah Berger/Getty Images for Amazon Web Services

AWS is gearing up for re:Invent, its annual cloud computing conference where announcements this year are expected to focus on its end-to-end data strategy and delivering new industry-specific services.

It will be the second re:Invent with CEO Adam Selipsky as leader of the industry’s largest cloud provider after his return last year to AWS from data visualization company Tableau Software.

Keep ReadingShow less
Donna Goodison

Donna Goodison (@dgoodison) is Protocol's senior reporter focusing on enterprise infrastructure technology, from the 'Big 3' cloud computing providers to data centers. She previously covered the public cloud at CRN after 15 years as a business reporter for the Boston Herald. Based in Massachusetts, she also has worked as a Boston Globe freelancer, business reporter at the Boston Business Journal and real estate reporter at Banker & Tradesman after toiling at weekly newspapers.

Image: Protocol

We launched Protocol in February 2020 to cover the evolving power center of tech. It is with deep sadness that just under three years later, we are winding down the publication.

As of today, we will not publish any more stories. All of our newsletters, apart from our flagship, Source Code, will no longer be sent. Source Code will be published and sent for the next few weeks, but it will also close down in December.

Keep ReadingShow less
Bennett Richardson

Bennett Richardson ( @bennettrich) is the president of Protocol. Prior to joining Protocol in 2019, Bennett was executive director of global strategic partnerships at POLITICO, where he led strategic growth efforts including POLITICO's European expansion in Brussels and POLITICO's creative agency POLITICO Focus during his six years with the company. Prior to POLITICO, Bennett was co-founder and CMO of Hinge, the mobile dating company recently acquired by Match Group. Bennett began his career in digital and social brand marketing working with major brands across tech, energy, and health care at leading marketing and communications agencies including Edelman and GMMB. Bennett is originally from Portland, Maine, and received his bachelor's degree from Colgate University.

Enterprise

Why large enterprises struggle to find suitable platforms for MLops

As companies expand their use of AI beyond running just a few machine learning models, and as larger enterprises go from deploying hundreds of models to thousands and even millions of models, ML practitioners say that they have yet to find what they need from prepackaged MLops systems.

As companies expand their use of AI beyond running just a few machine learning models, ML practitioners say that they have yet to find what they need from prepackaged MLops systems.

Photo: artpartner-images via Getty Images

On any given day, Lily AI runs hundreds of machine learning models using computer vision and natural language processing that are customized for its retail and ecommerce clients to make website product recommendations, forecast demand, and plan merchandising. But this spring when the company was in the market for a machine learning operations platform to manage its expanding model roster, it wasn’t easy to find a suitable off-the-shelf system that could handle such a large number of models in deployment while also meeting other criteria.

Some MLops platforms are not well-suited for maintaining even more than 10 machine learning models when it comes to keeping track of data, navigating their user interfaces, or reporting capabilities, Matthew Nokleby, machine learning manager for Lily AI’s product intelligence team, told Protocol earlier this year. “The duct tape starts to show,” he said.

Keep ReadingShow less
Kate Kaye

Kate Kaye is an award-winning multimedia reporter digging deep and telling print, digital and audio stories. She covers AI and data for Protocol. Her reporting on AI and tech ethics issues has been published in OneZero, Fast Company, MIT Technology Review, CityLab, Ad Age and Digiday and heard on NPR. Kate is the creator of RedTailMedia.org and is the author of "Campaign '08: A Turning Point for Digital Media," a book about how the 2008 presidential campaigns used digital media and data.

Latest Stories
Bulletins